23

Skye worked quietly in the kitchen. She was peeling vegetables, and had already sliced her fingers a couple of times.

Rachel didn’t understand why Skye had asked to wash her hands after each slice.

Skye cringed just thinking about what she might have eaten in her food over the last few meals.

“Mistress, Ezekiel summons you.” The deep voice surprised her, and she spun around.

A man in a white robe stood behind her. A house servant.

“Sure,” she said. She laid down her knife and glanced at Rachel. The woman nodded her approval, so Skye hurried after the man. They headed away from the heart of the house, and deeper into Ezekiel’s villa.

Her heart pounded harder with every footstep, and her excitement built. The council must have arrived. Philip would be coming soon, and they would find out how to get out of here. This was good. Very good.

She bit her lip as she thought of Philip. Philip had been on the verge of kissing her. Why? And why had she stopped him? The confusion was too much to process when she was already confused out of her head. If he wanted to kiss her, did that mean she could trust him? That when they got home he’d still be interested?

The servant led her past ornately decorated rooms, and she wondered at the treasures people like Saul and Ezekiel collected. The servant—or slave—stopped in front of a crude wooden door. “You should wait for the master inside.” He bowed deeply before letting Skye into the empty room.

She hurried inside and sat on a dark brown lounge. The room was as fancy as any in Saul’s home. Intricate, colorful tapestries hung from wooden rods. Bowls of fruit sat on a small table in the middle of several lounges.

Skye’s stomach growled, but she didn’t take the fruit. She was too anxious to hear what Ezekiel and the council had to say. This was it. A ticket home!

Minutes ticked by. At least, she assumed they were ticking by. Nothing really ticked in Sumer, but she didn’t know how time was measured so she’d stick with ticked.

When she couldn’t take it anymore, she hopped up from her place on the lounge. Pacing the room, she made her way to a large, arched window overlooking the orchards. She’d learned since working in the kitchen that Ezekiel farmed olives. She also learned a little about the area—there were land owners, merchants, commoners, and slaves. Ezekiel was a land owner. Saul was a merchant—very wealthy, but not nearly as wealthy or powerful as a land owner. No wonder there was tension toward Ezekiel on Saul’s part.

She scanned the scenery outside the window. Where was Ezekiel? Why had she been left here? The council members must have arrived, but where were they? And where was Philip?

“This is ridiculous,” she muttered. Taking a deep breath, she forced herself to calm down. Philip was further away than just the villa’s kitchen, so it would take a few extra minutes for him to reach her. And the council would probably speak together before calling her into the conversation.

She stood at the window and looked around. Ezekiel’s land stretched for as far as she could see. Rolling hills, some of them green with crops and some golden. She couldn’t tell if the golden was crop, too, or just sand in the distance.

The view was beautiful, reminding her of the area around Stonehenge. The place where she fell through time.

Philip didn’t share her crazy desire to stay in Sumer. But now that he’d mentioned these people were slaves? There was no way she’d stay here, living her life out under Ezekiel’s rule. The idea made her modern blood boil.

But the thought of going home scared her. On one hand, she wanted to reconnect with Mom. See if she could develop a relationship like the one Leah and Rachel shared. But on the other hand, the thought of going back to her life of solitude terrified her. She didn’t like having no friends. She didn’t like relying more on her housekeeper than her own mother.

And she liked having Philip around. Most of the time, she wasn’t even home, and when she was, she only had Mrs. Garrison from the soup kitchen or Mr. Kilpatrick from school. It’d been so long since she’d had a friend to hang out with that she’d forgotten how great it was. She didn’t want to lose him again. The thought clenched her stomach, and she bit her lip.

The door swung open, and she jumped. “Philip!”

He glanced at the woman with him—a worker from the kitchen—and nodded. “Thank you, ma’am.”

The woman gave him a strange look. “Will you be able to find your way out?”

He swallowed, and his Adam’s apple bobbed.

Philip? Nervous?

“Yes, ma’am,” he muttered.

The round woman glanced between them, and then out she went.

Philip hurried to Skye. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know. I was brought here, left, and told to stay. Are the council members here?”

He pulled her toward the window. The heat of his hands calmed her. “Seth and his dad are here, but Ezekiel ignored me completely. I was standing right there, and Seth’s dad called it bizarre. Then they went inside, and Ezekiel didn’t invite me in.”

She frowned. “Then what are you doing here?”

“I sneaked in. That lady brought me to you because I told her they’d sent me with a message for you.”

She gasped. “You lied to her?”

“What else was I supposed to do?”

This didn’t feel right at all. She looked out the window again, wishing things were as calm as they appeared in the hills surrounding Ezekiel’s home. “I don’t know, but we can’t do this on our own. We can get back to the city, but then what?”

“I don’t know. I guess we wait.”

She turned to him, worried. “What if Ezekiel finds you here, and you weren’t invited?”

He shrugged. “Who cares? I’m not one of his slaves.”

“But don’t you see?” Fear rose inside her, and she clasped her hands together. “We are. He brought us here and put us to work. Where can we go for refuge, if not here?”

Realization dawned in his eyes, and he shook his head. “This is so bad.”

She sighed and returned to the brown lounge she’d sat on before. Why had she insisted on going back to Stonehenge?

God, why didn’t You stop us?

Philip plopped down beside her, and her heart tightened. Was he the answer to her question? Maybe God had allowed this to happen for a reason. Maybe God knew they made great friends.

“So, did you change your mind about wanting to go home?” He grinned, and she stared in surprise. He couldn’t have read her mind—but weird.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I guess staying here couldn’t make sense, could it?”

He smiled again and shrugged. Then his smile fell. He watched her now, studying her. “Why did you run off earlier?” His voice was soft. Vulnerable.

Heat rushed to her cheeks, and she looked down. He had wanted to kiss her—she’d wanted him to kiss her. But she’d freaked. The words stuck in her throat, but she pushed away her discomfort. “At home, things will go back to how they were. I like the way they’ve become between us. I want you to keep being my friend.” She couldn’t bring herself to look at him, and he didn’t reply. His silence was like cold water poured over her heart.

The door rattled as it swung open, and she jerked away from Philip.

Ezekiel entered, a huge smile on his face.

Seth followed, along with an old man who had to be Seth’s father.

Skye’s stomach fluttered and twisted. Their words today in this room might seal her fate. But she refused to cower to them. She may not be Hebat, but she didn’t belong here, and they couldn’t keep her locked up. She stood from the lounge, tall and confident, waiting for them to fill her in.

“Sit, sit!” Ezekiel’s jovial voice boomed. But he wasn’t talking to her. He spoke to his companions. Council members. Seth was on the council?

Skye wasn’t sure what to do, so she remained standing.

“This is not everyone, as you know,” Ezekiel said to Seth and his father, “but we will get started.”

Seth leaned forward in his seat. “The festival is in full swing in the city. Saul moves forward with his plan.”

This put a frown on Ezekiel’s face, and Skye studied him. Was Seth a friend or a foe? She’d been sure she could trust him at one point, but now she didn’t know what to believe. Maybe he was a spy for Ezekiel.

“How can this be, if he doesn’t have the one he called Hebat?”

The men looked at Skye for the first time.

Seth’s father nodded toward her. “This is the girl?”

“That is right, Father,” Seth said. “Saul held her captive, but she escaped.”

“But who is he planning to sacrifice?” Ezekiel broke in. “If he has not Hebat?”

“He has another girl. A young one. He’s keeping her locked away, so that no one can see her. He has not revealed that his original Hebat is gone.”

Skye gasped. Saul had picked some random girl to sacrifice in her place? She couldn’t let him do that.

But she knew what Philip would say. These people were literally ancient history. She and Philip couldn’t risk their own lives for people who were already dead.

Could they?

“I want to know more of the bizarre happenings,” the older man said. “It is why I came.”

“I agree it is bizarre,” Ezekiel said. He turned to Skye and Philip. If he was upset that Philip had come on his own, he didn’t show it. “We have seen it once before, many years ago. It was when the stones were first pulled from the earth. Now the stones have been disturbed again. I fear the time travelers come because of the tower.”

The tower. Skye had seen it in the distance, when she was in the city. How had the tower brought her through time?

“That cursed project was brought about by Saul himself,” Seth’s father said. He spoke slowly, as if laboring over each word. “It should never have been approved.”

“Nevertheless, it was approved,” Ezekiel said.

Skye couldn’t take it anymore. “I don’t understand,” she broke in. “What does the tower have to do with anything?”

The men glanced at her and then at each other. No one spoke for long moments, and Skye squirmed in her seat. She should have kept her mouth shut and just listened.

“Where do you come from, girl?” Seth’s father’s question set her heart to racing.

“London, England. A place called Stonehenge.”

“And in what time?”

She swallowed hard. “The twenty-first century.”

The three men frowned, especially Seth. “Twenty-first century. What does this mean?”

She shook her head. “I can’t explain it unless I know what time I am in. What time is this?”

The men looked at one another again, their faces stern. Finally, Seth’s father sighed. “It has been two hundred years since the great flood passed.”

“There about,” Ezekiel cut in. “Good records were not kept directly following the flood.”

Skye sat frozen in her chair. The great flood? As in, Noah and the ark?

Her knowledge of the Bible wasn’t great. She’d only been going to the soup kitchen’s church services for a few months, but she’d heard about Adam and Eve, Noah, and the Tower of Babel.

The tower! She gasped.

Now she understood where and when she was. And it was way back—like 1800 B.C.

She and Philip were trapped in the days of the Tower of Babel. If she remembered the stories, the tower was built as a way for the people to showcase their own greatness—a tower built to heaven. The Lord came down to visit the tower, and he was displeased with the peoples’ attitudes. He stopped them from building.

Could it be true? No way. The Tower of Babel was Biblically located in a place called Shinar. Wasn’t it?

But then one of Mr. Kilpatrick’s lessons came back to her. He’d said Shinar and Sumer were the same place. They’d only been called different names at different times.

So, it was possible. Crazy, but possible.

“Can you explain your time better now?” Seth prompted.

Forcing her emotions to calm down, she nodded. “My time is many thousands of years in the future.”

She expected a reaction. Anything. But all she saw were blank stares. It was too much to comprehend.

“Can you please tell me how this relates to the tower?” If the tower in the city truly was the Tower of Babel, she wanted out of there before God confounded the people’s language. It’d been strange from the beginning that she and Philip could understand the people in Sumer, but now it made sense. The last thing she needed was to be trapped in a place where no one could understand anyone else. Talk about chaos.

Seth’s father spoke again, seeming to be the recognized leader of the group—which made sense, since he was really old. His slow words sent chills racing down Skye’s arms. “The tower is being built over ancient sacred land. When the flood began, many records were lost, but not all. The chosen ones were able to preserve by telling others the ancient stories, and from these, we have gathered much history.”

He paused, and Ezekiel cleared his throat. “It is from these stories we learned of a sacred religious ground in our own area. Many sacrifices have been made at a broken altar on the land that is now being used for the tower.” He shook his head. “Saul is mad, driven insane with his desire to be called great. He builds the tower now, hoping to reach heaven and be recognized for his greatness.”

“But the altar underneath the construction still oozes with the blood of past sacrifices,” Seth’s father said. “It is a link to the past and apparently the future, as well.”

Skye’s gaze drifted to Philip. Did he know the significance of what they were hearing? Did he know about the Tower of Babel?

“Is there a way to get home?” Philip asked.

That was the most important thing, even though a part of her still wanted to help the poor girl trapped by Saul.

The men looked to each other again, but this time Seth spoke. “Father, you have seen this before, have you not? You were on the council who saw it once before.”

The old man nodded, his long, white beard swaying with the movement. “I have seen it once, but things did not turn out well.”

Skye held her breath. That wasn’t what she wanted to hear.

“What happened, Father?”

“The men had been seen by too many others. Their fame spread quickly, and they were captured. Used for sport. They were never able to escape and return. When they tried, they were killed.”

Fear gripped her.

“Does Saul know?” Seth asked, confirming her fear. Their situations were the same, Skye and Philip’s, and these other time travelers’. Saul had captured them. Then he’d exploited her as Hebat. They would not be able to leave easily.

“There is no way to know,” Seth’s father answered. “However, I must think he knows she is not Hebat, especially since he moves forward with his wicked plan.”

“The Creator cannot be happy with Sumer.” Ezekiel put his head in his hands. It put a shiver in Skye’s heart. Even though she had seen Ezekiel frown, he was usually happy and jolly. She had never seen him like this, in true despair.

“You don’t believe in the gods, then?” Philip surprised her, and she spun toward him.

Ezekiel offered a sad smile. “Nay, I do not believe in those gods. Only the Creator God. He is the One I pray to and worship. He occasionally requires the sacrifice of an animal but never a girl.” He nodded toward Skye.

Skye met his eye, and she was put at ease. Ezekiel would not keep them here against their will, at least she didn’t think he would. “So what do we do to get home?” she asked. Her words came out breathless. Her heart pounded with adrenaline. She was anxious and yet scared to try getting home.

Seth’s father cleared his throat, and all eyes turned to him. “The tower holds the sacred stones. It is there you will find the doorway to return, but going into the city is dangerous for you. The people know you as Hebat. Saul will be looking for you, no doubt. Besides, the tower is heavily guarded. It always has been, as there are those who do not support Saul’s goals. He protects his investment against these fanatics.”

Seth raised a hand, stopping his father. “The tower is where the sacrifice is to take place. It will be the most dangerous place in all of the city.”

The sacrifice of the girl who was also not Hebat. Skye’s stomach turned, and she thought she might be sick.

“That complicates things,” Ezekiel said. He turned to her. “You will not find it easy to get inside or to remain unseen once you are inside.” Then he turned to Philip. “I do not know how you came to be a part of this meeting, stable boy. I meant to speak with you privately in order to formulate a distinct plan. Since you are here, though, I ask you this. Can you keep her safe? For if you fail, she will be sacrificed. Saul has guards on the lookout for you both. If you leave my care, it is on your head.”